Word-Wednesday for February 5, 2025

And here is the Wannaskan Almanac with Word-Wednesday for February 5, 2025, the sixth Wednesday of the year, the seventh Wednesday of winter, the first Wednesday of February, and the thirty-sixth day of the year, with three-hundred twenty-nine remaining.

 
Wannaska Phenology Update for February 5, 2025
Flying Squirrel
Glaucomys volans is the flying squirrel in Wannaska, and Glaucomys sabrinus is the flying squirrel in the South of Minnesota. Their "flight" is made possible by their patagium [/pə-TĀ-jē-əm/, n., a membrane or fold of skin between the forelimbs and hind limbs on each side of a bat or gliding mammal]. Slightly larger than a chipmunk and weighing about three ounces, the northern flying squirrel is noted for dense fur — glossy olive-brown above and white below — large brown eyes, and mild disposition. Only the shrews and moles have fur that comes close in softness and silkiness to that of flying squirrels. Females mate in early spring, and about five weeks later, give birth to three to five tiny, blind young. But right now, northern flying squirrels slow their body activity and sometimes nest in groups to stay warm. If you have a wood duck house, peek inside to see if there are a scurry [collective noun] of flying squirrels sharing body heat.

February Astronomical Events

February 5 Fickle Pickle Wednesday Menu Special: Potato Dumpling


February 5 Nordhem Wednesday Lunch: Updated daily, occasionally.


Earth/Moon Almanac for February 5, 2025
Sunrise: 7:48am; Sunset: 5:28pm; 3 minutes, 9 seconds more daylight today
Moonrise: 10:41am; Moonset: 1:53am, waxing gibbous, 47% illuminated.


Temperature Almanac for February 5, 2025
                Average            Record              Today
High             16                     46                     15
Low             -8                    -44                      3

Feathers of Impermanence
by Jack Pine Savage

Snow ridges border road sides
Deer sprawls on bloody winter drifts
    Two Eagles’ and Six Ravens’ sturdy beaks jab-scrape her hide
    Eight birds compete to gouge her clouded eyes
    Wandering winter wind ruffles feathers as the carnivores feast on impermanence
    These four-season scavengers collide with disappearing appearances

Temperatures drop like pearls of blood
Overnight, winds defer to winter
    Thin ice shapes wings’ leading edges
    while snowstorms wail their excesses
    Eagles and Ravens, turn to the bluster gusts
    that buffet feathers as birds go on feasting
In this colder season of scant gathering, calls and hoots often stop
except the Ravens – the windy Ravens –  who soar - then hop

Gone long before snows, the rootless, nomadic tribes
quit nests, nudge reluctant fledglings into fallen-open skies
    pitiful foraging pushes them farther south
    where opportunities enter ravenous mouths
    but not the Eagles, not the Ravens - they devise
    climate wisdom but stay stingy with their advice
    
Blue Jays make migration choices
Announce their staying with piercing voices
They will stay for suet cakes and seeds
    sunflowers and mealworms can satisfy their needs
    shrewd blue jays rarely stay too long
    voices fading as they wing to other nosh and homes

Canada geese stretch ash-gray wings
Honk their opinions about all things
    arrow south in a hundred vees
    thick with honks that croak a singularity
    No voice on Earth can divert their south-bound flight
    nor dissuade their wingbeats’ rhythm beating in the night

Great Blue Herons unfurl slate-gray sails wing-on-wing
    smaller convoys track to southern things
    crests blown back against the northern snows
    No shape or shadow can discourage their rasping cadence
    Or halt undivided migrations nor shake their balance

Wild Swans draped in purest plumage three hundred trumpets
    and their shimmering austral passage
    a northern exodus of avian monks in snowy robes
    streaming out of cloisters of La Grande Chartreuse
    as if god had finally told the truth

The flitting migrants ceaselessly leaving and endlessly arriving
Others always– and their few confrères – laugh at impermanence
rogues who stay behind amid the winter barrens’ impertinence
in the Great Whiteness where clouds float over evergreens
the few clear-hearted ones that can bear unbroken suchness
and who know ever-changing wisdom in their native oneness

The prescient Ravens know it all – ‘tis the origin of why they laugh
    Ever watchful for a stake in a meal, they parlay with wolves and make their pacts
This is why Great Odin keeps two Ravens perched and watching
from his thunderous shoulders – flying out and back

Attend the precocious Ravens
unafraid of Eagles’ secrets whistling through their pinions
    enchant and whisper the certainty of their void-black opinions    
that is, to have the sense to cackle and the wit to play
to taunt grounded dogs who run every time to catch them
as if suddenly north was south and hounds could fly away

February 5 Celebrations from National Day Calendar

• National Shower with a Friend Day
• National Weatherperson’s Day

February 5 Word Pun
In order to have a murder of crows, there must be probable caws.


February 5 Word Riddle
What do Kermit the Frog, John the Baptist, and Vlad the Impaler have in common?*


February 5 The Devil’s Dictionary Word-Pram
FLATTER, v.t. To impress another with a sense of one's own merit.

    The bungler boasts of his excellence—
    His hearers yawn and nod;
    The artist flatters his audience—
    They shout: "He is a god!"


February 5 Etymology Word of the Week
window
/ˈwindō/ n., an opening in the wall or roof of a building or vehicle that is fitted with glass or other transparent material in a frame to admit light or air and allow people to see out, from circa 1200, literally "wind eye," from Old Norse vindauga, from vindr "wind" + auga "eye" (from Proto-Indo-European root okw- "to see"). Replaced Old English eagþyrl, literally "eye-hole," and eagduru, literally "eye-door." Compare Old Frisian andern "window," literally "breath-door." Originally an unglazed hole in a roof. Most Germanic languages later adopted a version of Latin fenestra to describe the glass version (such as German Fenster, Swedish fönster), and English used fenester as a parallel word till mid-16th century. Window dressing in reference to shop windows is recorded from 1853; figurative sense is by 1898. Window seat is attested from 1778. Window of opportunity (1979) is from earlier figurative use in U.S. space program, such as launch window (1963). Window-shopping is recorded from 1904.


February 5 Historic Events, Literary or Otherwise, from On This Day

• 1676 Isaac Newton writes to fellow polymath Robert Hooke, “If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants”.
• 1846 Oregon Spectator is first newspaper to be published on the West Coast.
• 1887 Giuseppe Verdi's opera Otello premieres.
• 1916 Italian tenor Enrico Caruso records O Solo Mio.
• 1922 Reader's Digest magazine first published.
• 1924 Royal Greenwich Observatory begins broadcasting the hourly time signals known as the Greenwich Time Signal or the "BBC pips".
• 1940 Glenn Miller and his Orchestra record Tuxedo Junction.
• 1965 Beursschouwburg opens in Brussels.
• 1967 Bollingen Prize for poetry awarded to Robert Penn Warren.
• 1988 First prime-time wrestling match in 30 years, André the Giant defeats Hulk Hogan.

February 5 Author/Artist/Character Birthdays, from On This Day

• 1534 Giovanni de' Bardi, Italian writer.
• 1589 Esteban Manuel de Villegas, Spanish poet.
• 1589 Honorat de Brueil seigneur de Racan, French playwright and poet.
• 1626 Marie de Rabutin-Chantal, marquise de Sévigné, French author.
• 1662 Giuseppe Vignola, Italian composer.
• 1711 Joseph Umstatt, Austrian composer.
• 1732 Nathanael Gottfried Gruner, German composer.
• 1748 Christian Gottlob Neefe, German composer.
• 1775 Margaretha Jacoba de Neufville, Dutch author.
• 1804 Johan Ludvig Runeberg, Finnish poet.
• 1808 Carl Spitzweg, German painter.
• 1810 Ole Bull, Norwegian composer.
• 1848 Joris-Karl Huysmans, French writer.
• 1862 Felipe Villanueva y Gutierrez, Mexican composer.
• 1863 Armand Parent, Belgian composer.
• 1865 Harvey Worthington Loomis, American composer.
• 1866 Rossetter Gleason Cole, American composer.
• 1868 Lodewijk Mortelmans, Belgian composer.
• 1871 Jovan Dučić, Herzegovinian Serb poet.
• 1877 Elizabeth Shane, Irish poet.
• 1881 Frederick Lonsdale, British playwright.
• 1882 Felice Lattuada, Italian composer.
• 1889 Ioan Dumitru Chirescu, Romanian composer.
• 1892 George Saiko, Austrian writer.
• 1903 Nathaniel Owings, American architect.
• 1909 Grażyna Bacewicz, Polish composer.
• 1912 Zoltán Pongrácz, Hungarian avant-garde composer.
• 1913 Rozelle Claxton, American jazz pianist.
• 1914 William S. Burroughs, American writer.
• 1918 Gara Garayev [Kara Karayev], Soviet-Azerbaijani composer.
• 1921 John Pritchard, British conductor.
• 1927 John S. Beckett, Irish musician.
• 1930 Ulf Söderblom, Finnish conductor.
• 1937 Cocky van Oost [Kommertje van Vliet], Dutch ballet dancer.
• 1939 Patric Standford, British composer.
• 1940 H. R. Giger, Swiss surrealist artist.
• 1941  Rick Laird, Irish musician.
• 1942 Susan Hill, English playwright.
• 1943 Ivan Alexandrovich Tcherepnin, French-American composer.
• 1951 Elizabeth Swados, American theater composer, playwright.
• 1967 Olafur Eliasson, Icelandic-Danish artist.
• 1978 Vilém Veverka, Czech oboist.

Words-I-Looked-Up-This-Week Writer's Challenge
Write a story or pram from the following words:

• craze: /krāz/ v., make (someone) insane or wildly out of control; produce a network of fine cracks on (a surface).
• curragh: / KUR-uh/ n., IRISH, a marsh, bog, or fen; an area of wetland; (as a mass noun) marshland.
• grig: /ɡriɡ/ n., a small eel; a grasshopper or cricket.
• irruption: /i-RəP-shən/ n., an act or instance of irrupting, such as: a sudden, violent, or forcible entry : a rushing or bursting in; a sudden and violent invasion; a sudden sharp increase in the relative numbers of a natural population usually associated with favorable alteration of the environment.
• hipoisie: /hip-wah-ZEE/ n., hip people considered collectively or as a type.
• janded: /JAN-did/ adj., designating a person who has travelled overseas; of, relating to, or characteristic of such a person.
• jjigae: /chee-geh/ (찌개) n., KOREAN, a stew made with meat, seafood, or vegetables in broth.
• luchador: /LOO-CHə-dôr/ n., a person who competes in lucha libre wrestling.
• pleach: /plēCH/ v., entwine or interlace (tree branches) to form a hedge or provide cover for an outdoor walkway.
• screech: /skrēCH/ v., give a loud, harsh, piercing cry; n., a loud, harsh, piercing cry; a rum that originated in Jamaica and was a staple drink in Newfoundland, where the term "screech" is a colloquial term for inexpensive, high-alcohol spirits, originally imported to Newfoundland as part of the triangular trade, shipped to the West Indies in exchange for salt fish, where The Newfoundland and Labrador Liquor Corporation (NLC) began bottling screech in 1957, tasting like a blend of Demerara rums from Guyana that are aged for 4 to 8 years with a sweet taste of caramelized sugars, spices, oak, and vanilla, traditionally celebrated in the Newfoundland Screech-In ceremony, which involves kissing a cod, and includes reciting the Screecher's Creed and toasting Newfoundland, available in liquor stores across Canada, also distributed in New England.

From the waters of the Avalon, to the shores of Labrador,

We’ve always stuck together, with a Rant and a Roar.

To those who’ve never been, soon they’ll understand,

From coast to coast, we raise a toast, We love thee Newfoundland!

February 5, 2025 Word-Wednesday Feature
Irish Fairyland Vocabulary
The most recent addition to the Word-Wednesday library is Fairy Legends & Traditions of the South of Ireland, by Thomas Crofton Croker. To check it out from a library I would have had to travel to Winnipeg or Fargo. Born just over two weeks ago in 1798 in the city of Cork, at age 15, he apprenticed in business before traveling to the South of Ireland (as opposed to southern Ireland) during the years 1812 to 1815, collecting legends and songs. Fairy Legends was published as an anthology of tales Croker had collected on his field trips, but he had lost his manuscript notes well before publication, and the work had to be reconstructed with the help of friends. Friends were not entirely pleased. William Butler Yeats, who appropriated a number of tales for his anthology, characterized Croker as belonging to the class of the Anglo-Irish ascendancy, and Yeats criticized Croker for comic distortions of the Irish tradition, an assessment echoed by other Irish critics.

This matters little to the Word-Wednesday staff, who today feature some Irish fairy names and terms so that Wannaskan Almanac readers might begin to comprehend the lengths, breadths, and depths of the Irish imagination, readers who enjoy reading or writing about parallel universes, and as inspiration for any tales of fairies that you might choose to write. Wannaska no doubt has fairies dwelling in and around Mikinaak Crick and the Roseau River, especially under the Beito-McDonnell Bridge spanning majestic County Road 8, which we hope to read about in future editions of Wannaskan Almanac from WannaskaWriter and Chairman Joe.

• Aingil Anúabhair: /AING-il ah-NOO-uh-wir/ proper name, proud or haughty angels.
• Aos Sí: /EES SHEE/ proper name, the supernatural beings or "fairy folk" in Irish mythology, often associated with the Tuatha Dé Danann (see below) and believed to live in the Otherworld or beneath the earth.
• Ábartach:  /AW-bur-takh/ proper name, a mythical dwarf-like chieftain in Ireland who was said to have supernatural powers. According to folklore, he rose from the grave after being killed and demanded blood from the living—making him one of the earliest vampire legends. Some believe this story inspired Bram Stoker’s Dracula.
• banshee: BAN-shee; n., translated as woman of the fairy mound or fairy woman, is a female spirit in Irish folklore who heralds the death of a family member; proper name in Irish is Bean Sidhe, pronounced the same as the English.
• Clíodhna: /KLEE-uh-na/ also (Clídna, Clionadh, Clíodna, Clíona, transliterated to Cleena in English) Queen of the Banshees of the Tuatha Dé Danann.
• Creideamh Sí: /KREJ-uv SHEE/ n.,  translates to Fairy Faith and refers to the traditional Irish belief system surrounding the Aos Sí (fairy folk or spirits). This includes folklore about fairy mounds, protective rituals, and superstitions about respecting these supernatural beings.
• Daoine Maithe: /“DEE-nuh MAH-huh/ n., means The Good People, a respectful way of referring to the Aos Sí in Irish folklore. This euphemism was used to avoid offending these supernatural beings, who were believed to be powerful and sometimes unpredictable.
• daoine uaisle: /DEE-nuh sheee Ū-əʃl-ə/ n., the noble folk in Irish mythology.
• deamhan aerig: n., a demon of the air in Irish tradition.
• dullahan: /DŪ-lə-hɑn/ n.,  a type of legendary creature in Irish folklore depicted as a headless rider on a black horse, or as a coachman, who carries his own head.
• Ellén Trechend: /ELL-in TREKH-end/ proper name of a three-headed monster referred to in Irish mythology, mentioned in the text Cath Maige Mucrama (The Battle of Mag Mucrima) as having emerged from the cave of Cruachan (Rathcroghan, County Roscommon) and laid waste to Ireland until it was killed by the Ulaid poet and hero Amergin, demonstrating that Elléns are the Karen's of Irish folklore.
• leannán sídhe: /lhi-AN-an shee/ (lit. “fairy lover”) n.,  a figure from Irish folklore depicted as a beautiful woman of the Aos Sí who takes a human lover. Lovers of the leannán sídhe are said to live brief, though highly inspired, lives.
• leprechaun: /LEH·pruh·kaan/ n., a small, mischievous fairy often depicted as a shoemaker obsessed with gold hidden at the end of a rainbow.
• púca: /PŪ-kə/ n., a shapeshifting spirit that can appear as various animals, sometimes considered a type of fairy, mischievous but not malevolent, corresponding to the English Puck.
• sídheógaídhe: /SHEE-oh-gee/ n., youth of the fairy mounds of Aos sí.
• Slúagh na Marbh: /SLOO-uh nah MAR-uv/ proper name, "Host of the Dead, the hosts of the unforgiven dead in Irish folklore.
• Slúagh Sídhe: /SLOO-uh SHEE/ proper name, "Fairy Host", one of the most fascinating and evil groups to form part of The Sluagh Sídhe are spirits of the unforgiven or restless dead who soared the skies at night searching for humans to pick off.
• Tuatha Dé Danann: TOO-a(h) deh DAH-nun/ proper name meaning "the folk of the goddess Danu, also known by the earlier name Tuath Dé ("tribe of the gods”), a supernatural race in Irish mythology.

From A Year with Rilke, February 5 Entry
Inside the Rose, from New Prams

What can enclose
this ample innerness?
So soft is this touch,
it could soothe any wound.
What skies are reflected
on the inland lake
of these open roses,
these untroubled ones?
See how loose and lax they lie,
as if an abrupt gesture
would not scatter them.
They barely keep their shape.
They fill to overflowing
with inner space, spilling out
into days that swell
and close around them
until the whole summer becomes a room,
a room in a dream.

Roses 

by Vincent van Gogh

Be better than yesterday,
learn a new word today,
try to stay out of trouble - at least until tomorrow,
and write when you have the time.







*The same middle name.